Healthy Mind, Happy Heart Wellington, New Zealand

Month: May 2017

7 August: 8 week Rewire Your Brain for Happiness, MBSR training. This succesful mindfulness training is for beginners and for those who have done a short training before. Integrate mindfulness into your daily life and get 10+ downloadable exercises to practice at home. Down to earth class.

Mindfulness Workout of the week.

One of the things that always works, and is also part of the mindfulness for kids programme Pause Breathe Smile is that children are asked to smile as part of the mindfulness practices.

The body and brain are connected, they trigger each other and listen to another. You can use that, to influence how you feel. If you move your mouth into a smiley pose that will make you feel a little more positive. I bet you are trying it right now 😁

So this week, all you have to focus on, is to consciously bring your mouth to smile, a couple of times a day, and see what happens.

You can put a sticky note with a smiley face on your mirror, draw a little smiley on your hand, change your passwords to finish with SMILE, or set a timer a couple of times a day, anything to remind yourself to smile.

23 May: Creative Mindfulness. Down to earth and friendly weekly classes to learn mindfulness and be creative. Crochet, zendoodle, colour, knitting, origami, no artistic talents needed! So you look after your wellbeing in a fun way and stress less!

28 May: All Good Colourers, a monthly koha meet up for adults to colour, doodle and chat.

7 August: 8 week Rewire Your Brain for Happiness, MBSR training. This succesful mindfulness training is for beginners and for those who have done a short training before. Integrate mindfulness into your daily life and get 10+ downloadable exercises to practice at home. Down to earth class.

WORKOUT STARTS HERE >>>>>>>>>>

Happy Monday morning! Tomorrow is already lesson 3 of the creative mindfulness! You can still tag along!

Last week was filled with mixed emotions. Happy to see my girl having her fun birthday party, and watching my son starting his sports.

And also a sad week, of many people that passed away. Which can make us think of other people we have lost before too.

I always have to catch my self, as my mind easily gets on the train of more sad thoughts and memories, and I have to stop myself from getting on that train too much!

Mindfulness can be a good help in learning to sit back and observe what is popping up in your head, observing the emotions that come and go. So that we can decide where to go, what thoughts to pursue, and what thought to let go.

As you don’t have to finish the thoughts that pop up in your mind, and you don’t have to get on the train to all the other thoughts that this one thought might lead you too. You can choose!

So this week, try to be more mindful of where your thoughts are taking you. And see if you can take a pause to decide if you want to go on that train, or if you are going to let it pass.

16 May: Creative Mindfulness. Down to earth and friendly weekly classes to learn mindfulness and be creative. Crochet, zendoodle, colour, knitting, origami, no artistic talents needed! So you look after your wellbeing in a fun way and stress less!

28 May: All Good Colourers, a monthly koha meet up for adults to colour, doodle and chat.

7 August: 8 week Rewire Your Brain for Happiness, MBSR training. This succesful mindfulness training is for beginners and for those who have done a short training before. Integrate mindfulness into your daily life and get 10+ downloadable exercises to practice at home. Down to earth class.

It was mother’s day yesterday, and as every Sunday I Skype my mum. We talked about how we both often feel amazed by time. We’re both feeling at least 20 years younger than we are!! So the good thing is that we both feel young at heart 💖

It does make me think though, are we not accepting that we are aging? Are we avoiding, looking the other way? I like to think we are not!

We are just chosing to live in the present, not thinking to much about what is ahead of us, and taking in every day with joy, not counting the days.

Every now and than we look back in awe and maybe sadness, realising that so many years flew by, just like that! And that’s ok too, it’s ok to have all different feelings about that, however not lingering there too long maybe.

It’s by acknowledging and accepting that change, time passing, and growing older is part of life, and inevitable, that helps us to move on again.

So this week take a moment to reflect on your life, the years that have been and your plans for the future. How does it make you feel? Can you accept that change, time passing and growing older is part of life? Are there things you want to do, or that you are going to do differently in the future?

9 May: Creative Mindfulness. Down to earth and friendly weekly classes to learn mindfulness and be creative. Crochet, zendoodle, colour, knitting, origami, no artistic talents needed! So you look after your wellbeing in a fun way and stress less!

28 May: All Good Colourers, a monthly koha meet up for adults to colour, doodle and chat.

7 August: 8 week Rewire Your Brain for Happiness, MBSR training. This succesful mindfulness training is for beginners and for those who have done a short training before. Integrate mindfulness into your daily life and get 10+ downloadable exercises to practice at home. Down to earth class.

Free Weekly Mindfulness Workout

Wow our daughter turned 17 this weekend, amazing how time flies.

It’s so important to train yourself to live more in the present moment, so you really take in all that is happening in your daily life!! Because one day you turn around and those little kids have turned in tall adults 🙂

This week try to bring yourself back to the present moment whenever you notice you are distracted from being fully present. You can be distracted by things like your phone, sounds, or your own thinking. Try to catch your self sooner, every time you have wandered off, away from the here and now.

It can help to silently say all that is present, all you can see, hear, feel, smell, taste right here in front of you, to keep your mind focussed on where you are right now, here in this moment.

This will get easier as you practice more. And as you get less distracted by your thoughts, you will also get less vulnerable for negative thinking and negative feelings.

Fun colouring yesterday with the Tawa All Good Colourers! Hope you can join us next time, 28 May!!

Next week Tuesday 9 May the weekly Creative Mindfulness starts again! 7.30-9pm, learn some mindfulness and be creative in a friendly and down to earth class. Learn to crochet, zendoodle, origami or bring your own projects to work on.

Workout starts here>>>

Mindfulness helps to be more aware of what’s going on in your mind. Our brain is wired to focus on everything that could be a possible threat and isn’t naturally inclined to focus on the good stuff. However, if we are not mindful of the good stuff, it is hard to feel good about ourself and our lives. So you have to train your brain, to take in all that’s good around us.

So this week, try to notice when you are thinking about negative or neutral things, and bring your attention to all that is good right here in this moment.